UPenn law professor tells Tucker Carlson that “Blacks” and other “non-Western” groups harbor “resentment and shame and envy”

Wax then attacked Indian immigrants for criticizing racism in the U.S. when “their country is a shithole”

Written by Nikki McCann Ramirez

Research contributions from Madeline Peltz

Published

On the April 8 edition of his Fox Nation program, Tucker Carlson hosted University of Pennsylvania Law School professor Amy Wax for a discussion about her views on diversity initiatives in academia, during which she accused Black people and “Third World” immigrants of harboring “resentment and shame and envy” against Western people for their “outsized achievements and contributions.”

Wax has been on the receiving end of public criticism regarding a series of comments she’s made on race and culture. In a 2017 op-ed for The Philadelphia Inquirer, Wax had argued that “all cultures are not equal. Or at least they are not equal in preparing people to be productive in an advanced economy.” Wax singled out certain groups, including “Blacks” and Hispanics for not conforming to what she described as “bourgeois” and “free-market” cultural values.

In subsequent interviews, Wax had doubled down on her assessment, stating that immigrants are attracted to “countries ruled by white Europeans” and affirming that she did not shrink away from describing those countries and cultures as “superior.”

More recently, Wax appeared on the podcast of Brown University professor Glenn Loury, during which she incorrectly claimed that she’d never seen a Black Pennsylvania Law student graduate at the “top quarter” of their class. In a subsequent defense of her interview, Wax argued that “the United States is better off with fewer Asians and less Asian immigration.”

On Tucker Carlson Today, Wax once again defended her position as the two discussed her Loury interview. While defending her claim about Black students, Wax called affirmative action a “poison” infecting the well of academia.

From the April 8, 2022, edition of Fox Nation's Tucker Carlson Today

AMY WAX (LAW PROFESSOR): [Black students] clump towards the bottom 10% of the class or 15% of the class. Occasionally, people would break out of that and even make it into the top.

But what's ironic here and I, you know, this is a very roundabout way of putting it, is that this pattern has been well known in law schools for decades. No one seriously doubts that Black students tend to underachieve in law schools, the practice of affirmative action selective law schools. A professor named Richard Sander at UCLA published a law review article — I think it was in Stanford; it may have been another law review — in which he just lays out the data that he obtained from a number of law schools. Of course now it would be almost impossible to get that data that showed that, you know, that showed that there was not an even distribution of grades.

Now, you know, they made such a big deal out of it, but it's really not that big a deal in the following sense, Tucker. You know, you could argue about the pros and cons of affirmative action. When I discussed this with Glenn Loury, it was not along the lines of “well, this shows that we should just get rid of affirmative action. I mean, this fact alone means that affirmative action is a disaster.” That was not the gist of the conversation. The gist of the conversation was, you know, there are upsides and downsides to affirmative action, and one of the downsides is that, you know, Blacks have a hard time when they're overmatched by their classmates, which is the whole point of affirmative action, doing really well academically.

...

WAX: Now I happen to be opposed to affirmative action. I’ve become more opposed, and I can explain why.

TUCKER CARLSON (HOST): Tell me why.

WAX: The reason I've become more opposed to affirmative action is because I think it has poisoned the entire academic enterprise. It is like this poison that you drop into a well and it just spreads everywhere and goes through all the pipes and there's no place.

CARLSON: All the capillaries.

WAX: All the capillaries, all the tiniest little, you know, end points of where the water goes. That's an analogy. And what do I mean by that? I think if you were to look at the orthodoxy, at the accepted narrative, at the priorities of academia today, which is diversity above everything else and safe spaces and psychological comfort for minority students and disadvantaged minorities, especially, or underachieving minorities — though they’ll never call them that. That is the most important thing, and anybody who says anything about groups or about race or about different populations that would in any way upset someone who is a minority — probably in many cases here because of affirmative action — that person needs to be punished. And it just affects everything that people study, the sorts of opinions that they can express, what you're allowed to say, what you're not allowed to say. It all comes back to hiding the fact that some groups are more competitive than others, that there is this academic achievement gap that has not gone away, and because of it, we now have everywhere in academia, not just double standards, Tucker, but a wholesale attack on standards.

CARLSON: Well, that’s there, right there. That’s right. It’s an attack on the idea of achievement, even.

Shortly after, Wax claimed that efforts to foster diversity and inclusion were the result of “Blacks” and other “non-Western” groups harboring “resentment and shame and envy” against Western people for their “outsized achievements and contributions.”

Wax then attacked Indian immigrants for criticizing racism in the U.S. when “their country is a shithole” and went on to say, “The role of envy and shame in the way that the Third World regards the First World is underestimated ... and it creates ingratitude of the most monstrous kind.”

From the April 8, 2022, edition of Fox Nation's Tucker Carlson Today

AMY WAX (LAW PROFESSOR): I think there is just a tremendous amount of resentment and shame of non-Western peoples against Western peoples for Western peoples’ outsized achievements and contributions. I mean, it's really unbearable. I was actually —  you know, leaving aside American Blacks, who I think do feel that resentment and shame and envy. I mean, it's this unholy brew of sentiments. I was talking to Glenn Loury about this bizarre fact that Asian and South Asian, Indian doctors at Penn Med, which I know people there and I know what's going on there — that they're on the ramparts for the anti-racism initiative for dump on America, America is an evil, racist place. These are immigrants.

...

WAX: I'm not saying all Indians are this way. I'm just saying, you look at the roster of, you know, who's leading the programs, the endless number of programs where they talk about diversity and racism and all the racism that people have to encounter in medicine and how racist medicine is and all this. And you see these brown faces or you see these Asian faces and you think, I mean, literally, you think so you're coming from your country, which you're implying, you know, is equal or better than our country —

[CROSSTALK]

TUCKER CARLSON (HOST): That has a freaking cast system, literally.

WAX: And you're telling us how awful we are. Well, what's the explanation for that?

...

WAX: So, take the Brahmin women who come from India and they climb the ladder, they get the best education. We give them every opportunity and they turn around and lead the charge on we're racist, ww’re an awful country, we need reform, our medical system needs reform. Well, here's the problem. They're taught that they are better than everybody else because they are Brahmin elites. And yet, on some level, their country is a shithole, excuse my language.

CARLSON: No, it’s — yeah,

WAX: OK, it's not providing them with the opportunities that they feel that they deserve and which in many cases they do deserve. They come here and they see that we have this wonderful developed scientific and medical establishment, which they haven't managed to create. They realize that, you know, we've outgunned and outclassed them in practically every way. And what do they feel? Well, they're very proud people. They're a shame culture and they feel anger, they feel envy, they feel shame. I think the role of envy and shame in the way that the Third World regards the First World is underestimated.

CARLSON (HOST): I think you're exactly right. I think you're exactly right.

WAX: It's never talked about.

CARLSON: No. And you've been really penalized for talking about it.

WAX: And it creates ingratitude of the most monstrous kind. I feel like asking some of these people, like, why did you leave your country? Why are you here?

 

Correction (4/12/22): This piece originally misspelled the name of the Philadelphia Inquirer.